The Books of To-day and the Books of To-morrow, June 1907
 

All about the Aerial Derby.


A DARING New Yorker said, ‘Gee!
Aerial racing for me!’
But something went pop,
And he started to drop . . . .
No flowers by request. R.I.P.

There was a young man in the air,
Whose friends said. ‘Oh, Percy, take care!’
He answered, ‘Oh, pooh,
I know what to do!’ . . . .
Yes, that’s Percy in yonder bath-chair.

A magnate who hailed from the Rand
Wished to rise, so he threw out some sand.
But it chanced to smash flat
A Duchess’s hat.
That man is now socially banned.

A boastful young man said, ‘Look here,
With what ease my balloon I can steer.’
He started for Spain
Via Salisbury Plain,
But the spot that he reached was Cashmere.

A young man remarked with a grin,
‘This race I am certain to win.’
But he rather lost heart
When he found at the start
That his gas-bag was pierced with a pin.
STOP-PRESS NEWS.
There is a young man in a tree,
Whose speech is one vast, lurid D.
He has been there, they say,
For a week and a day.
Will he ever get home to his tea?

 


 

Printed unsigned; entered by Wodehouse in Money Received for Literary Work as “The Aerial Derby.”